I met Kobe at the "Faces of Courage" event I do every year (I'm on my 5th year there)... basically it's a kids camp for poor kids with cancer, blood disorders, asthma, and other ailments... Kobe is one of the kids who just has Asthma, which is on the lighter end of the scale compared to a lot of the other kids there who have cancer.

But basically he's a kid who's dad bailed on him when he was little, his mom is very poor, and he's kind of a troubled kid. So I agreed to kinda take him under my wing and teach him how to make stuff, but he has to cut the bullshit at school so he doesn't get expelled, and not talk back to his mom...

thanks for the encouraging words guys... I'm a pretty strong-personality type of person, and this kid & I had a little showdown last year, but I stuck to my guns & made him kinda straighten up, so he respects me & understands that I'm not going to put up with any bullshit....

but the way I see it, I live a very charmed life. I mean, shit... I own my own business and make a pretty decent living doing what a lot of people do just for fun, I have a boat & surfboards to play with, and I generally have a lot of fun. I can share a little of that with him and give him something to look forward to, and give him a reason not to act like a little asshole... lol...

His mother texted me this morning and said he's so excited about working with me that she had a hard time getting him to go to bed last night. Hopefully I can leverage that to get him flyin' straight.

anyway, this lovely piece of cedar is going to be some kind of sales trophy for corona beer... let's do this...

2 espresso marquesian heads I did last week (fun quickies), the cedar buddha I'm slowly carvin' for my massage therapist who works on me for free (also one of my ex's), the slabs next to the door are southern mahogany & I've got 2 more makua's drawn out on there, the crown for corona beer is up there next to the black jug of chainsaw oil (pain in the ass), and the angel is one that my buddy from vegas showed up at my house with after he'd been drinking beer all day,,, I'm puttin' a screw-in bowl on the end of the horn & making it the BONG ANGEL... lol...